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Talk:Danny Elfman
Preserving ] Relevance? I saw Danny Elfman's name in a connections list, so I thought "Cool, what did he do with the Muppets/Creature Shop?" And then I saw this page, and the answer is really "Nothing." We've had some borderline connections before (I'm still not a fan of our numerous "Random person posing with a Fraggle" at some event pages), but this is basically the "almost but not quite" category, like celebrities who appeared in The Earth Day Special but not with Kermit. After the list of linked pages, which is admittedly nice, it boils down to three potential points. Elfman music was used at the same Hollywood Bowl concert as a Muppet appearance, but *not* for any Muppet skit. There's nothing on the Hollywood Bowl page to suggest they even had anything to do with the Elfman portion (maybe they introduced it, and we sometimes have cheated a tad to count that as interaction, but right now everything we have suggests they didn't) We have something similar but in fact even more of a stretch in my opinion, that Kermit and Miss Piggy introduced Cirque Du Soleil, and *they* used Elfman's music. That's almost like creating a page for people in movies directed by Frank Oz. Here's the only one that strikes me as almost a connection, but even then it's very indirect and would really count more as a reference. "In 2011, Elfman's theme from the 1986 film Back To School was used in an AMC Theatres Policy trailer featuring the Muppets." That at least is a little more than just Elfman music and Muppets happening to be part of the same larger events. But it's still not much since lots of songs or music are used in trailers and promos, usually without the original composer even knowing beyond getting a residual check and definitely without personal involvement, so that would be more like the use of John Wayne clips on Muppet Babies. So, unless there's anything else beyond what is on this page, there are two options. Reorganize the page and keep it as Category:Musical References for the song sampling (although one could almost just as easily make it a Back to School page, but Elfman is more fun as a connection). I do like the idea of having Elfman on the wiki so I have no real problem with that as a compromise. Or we just delete it until we have a real solid connection and just keep the Back to School thing as a note on the policy trailer page, which we've done in many cases like that, where it really isn't quite solid enough to justify a page but neat enough to note, especially if we have more. My main concern is just that Danny Elfman is being linked from pages as an actual Muppet connection, I clicked the link, and then find out he really doesn't have a direct connection. So even just reworking and relabeling would take care of that (and if we ever find a solid direct connection, which is still quite possible, we recat; I was able to do that just the other day with Ginger Rogers which means we can now legitimately add her to any connections lists on other pages). So that was longwinded and a bit nerdy (naturally). Thoughts? Otherwise, in a few days or a week, I'll be bold and just adjust myself. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 04:51, July 13, 2013 (UTC) :I think we're long past the point of being so strict on things like this. Beethoven didn't directly with the Muppets either, but they used his music. —Scott (message me) 12:15, July 16, 2013 (UTC) ::We're still strict on this actually. We don't count Beethoven as a celebrity, and for Category:Composers, we've not created pages for people who only had one song covered, and so on. To be in Category:Celebrities, we still require either actual interaction (even if it's just sending a recipe to Miss Piggy under their name). We established that as a full policy. And we don't let anyone who's just in Category:Celebrity References count as a connection. So that's the question. Looking at the history of the person who started the page, they added the fact that Elfman scored the Cirque du Soleil segment. They found that he was mentioned on the Hollywood Bowl and AMC pages and made the page. Really, if this was anyone *but* Danny Elfman or of similar stature, we wouldn't even be discussing it, it would be a straight deletion. But it is nice to get him on the Wiki, but we still have to play fair with our connections, and I think it *is* confusing to click his name in a list and find that he really did nothing at all with the Muppets; that the Muppets were *at* two events that used his music elsewhere (and that's definitely not a precedent we want to set for page creation) and one theme song was used in a trailer. -- Andrew Leal (talk) :::I agree with Andrew. There's no connection here. Elfman hasn't done any work with the Muppets. When Rowlf puts a bust of Danny Elfman on his piano, then we can make this a Musical Reference. Until then, the dude needs to work with the Muppets or get off the wiki. :) -- Danny 04:54, July 24, 2013 (UTC) ::::His music was used in a Muppet production. I agree it's a weak connection, but Rachmaninoff's was also used in a Muppet production. Should we not cover this stuff anymore? —Scott (message me) 13:14, July 24, 2013 (UTC) :::::Also, why are we on a talk page? I thought our days of counting indent marks were over. —Scott (message me) 13:14, July 24, 2013 (UTC) ::::::I agree; see also:Talk:Gregg_Alexander. -- Brad D. (talk) 15:07, July 24, 2013 (UTC) :::::::I chose the talk page over the forum because this was about a possible merge or deletion. When I've used the forums for that, and someone comes along later, it's difficult to find the original page being discussed or even the redlink if deleted (when/if forum navigation and organization is fixed a bit more, and also easier to link to when asking folks to weigh in then Thread:Number976.5, it won't matter). Anyway, our established guidelines. One, it doesn't make him count as a celebrity, see my earlier response and guidelines on Category talk:Celebrities. We don't count Rachmaninoff as such. Two, from Category talk:Composers: "The requirement for pre-existing compositions is that either there be a significant number of works utilized (as with the classical folks), at least more than three (I forget what exact number we came up with) or else they already have a page a genuine reference or other participation." This wasn't even a cover by the Muppets, this was pre-existing movie music sampled for a trailer (which we noted on the trailer page, and that was sufficient coverage until a user decided to add the not-really-connections stuff about the Oscars and the concert). Rachmaninoff was referenced by name at least on Sesame Street. So Elfman fails our guidelines for Celebrities as a category and for Composers. We'd just be making an exception because he's Danny Elfman. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 18:04, July 24, 2013 (UTC) ::::::::Ah, right. I forgot about the 3 compositions rule. John Philip Sousa and Scott Joplin also fail that criteria. —Scott (message me) 18:30, July 24, 2013 (UTC) :::::::::Sousa has a reference when Sam name checked him (a direct reference plus a usage makes the page relevance). Good catch on Joplin, I think we just missed him when we did category cleanup (plus anything really relevant is on the song pages, outside of historically uncertain birth date, death date, and the picture; we don't have anything else on that page). So yeah, I'll delete that one. And for the record, but I think that's clear anyway, we only applied that to covers or classical music used and so on because there were so many who either had pages or so many redlinks for them, as opposed to people who wrote original songs and music for Muppet projects, which we want to track even if it's just one piece as long as we have sufficient info beyond a name on an ASCAP registration. The sourcing and citations conversation is still priority when I have time amidst or amongst visits to Mom and household stuff, but I think we're due for another composers conversation as both a better recap and to double check what's in there now, and I'll definitely do *that* in forums for indentation avoidance. Looking at it, we never uniformly fixed that category as far as singer/songwriters as guest stars who performed their own songs either (Mac Davis and John Denver are in, but Elton John and Roger Miller aren't). That conversation just sort of stalled. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 18:51, July 24, 2013 (UTC) ::::::::::I wonder though, why does it bother us so much that Sousa, Elfman and Joplin are on the wiki? —Scott (message me) 21:15, July 24, 2013 (UTC) (Abandoning indents for now) See Talk:Falco. You actually helped start the rule way back. Sousa isn't a problem, as I said. There are two aspects to the rule. One, which I kept repeating, is that they don't count as a *celebrity* if there's no direct connection. So even if we kept the page, it couldn't be in celebrities and shouldn't count as a connection. That's cheating. Secondly, we have tons of song pages for covers, many with more than one writer, so to give a page for each person whose song was covered would become a huge task and in many cases boring (and we've deleted many pages in the past for that; and Talk:Gregg Alexander, where someone's song was sampled for a trailer but not used in the actual movie and not performed by the Muppets; nobody ever responded to that one so I just deleted after a full two months). Scott Joplin is a more famous composer than most and his page is pretty bad. And Elfman wasn't "covered," he was sampled. As I said, that does bring it closer to something like Cary Grant, but if Grant had only one clip, and it was his voice only (it may seem unfair but having a visual makes a difference; it's like we discussed way back, how visual references trump verbal only references and someone saying "It's Big Bird!" as far as making a worthwhile page). This is very common practice on trailers so we note that kind of thing on the trailer page but don't create a page for the person. Again, we hadn't before when that was the only connection. Someone did because they thought the Oscars and concert made it count as actual interaction, and it doesn't. If I'd caught it before the page grew, I don't think anyone would even question the deletion, but that doesn't increase the relevance (we've also deleted pages for networks when all we have to say is they aired two Henson shows; granted we can and should be harder on networks since usually all they do is air something, but it still helps a bit, when those instances occur, to minimize the opportunity for users to pull the old "But such and such is around" argument). I love connection lists but I also play strictly fair with them, however much I'd like to have Ed Wynn on Old-time radio, so I don't want to suddenly change the guideline to that for one person and for no really justifiable reason. As I said in my very first post, *if* enough people thought we needed the page (right now it's three to one), we'd have to just keep it as Musical References, since that's all it is. They didn't even actually perform his song, just took it from the movie soundtrack. We deleted pages for Category:Creature Shop Actors (including many of my favorites) because their scenes didn't involve Creatures, even if they shared space. This isn't so different. And there's just the factor in terms of "Is there anything to justify the page beyond one thing noted on another page, and a Wikipedia bio?" We've used that as a rule of thumb. Danny's deleted pages for actual performers when at the time we just had "Additional Muppet Performers" and some non-Muppet background (frankly, I wish he hadn't for Bob Dermer, since it had the only pic I ever found of the man; now I think I've IDed who he played in Basil Hears a Noise but the page would be minus a pic). That often hasn't made me happy and would be another discussion, but if we're going to be that strict on people who directly worked with the Muppets, it does seem even more unfair to let Danny Elfman slide because we like Danny Elfman. Really that's all it seems like to me. Looking at discussions, we actually seem to have left the number of song uses at a less specific but emphatic "More than one" rather than three. It came up again when you'd deleted Bob Merrill, as discussed here. Probably other examples but I'm way too stressed right now to keep searching. My PC keeps crashing or freezing windows or not letting anything post to Wiki. My chest hurts, my throat is tight, and I'm trying to dry Mom's caftans. Anything else on this, I'll have to wait to add tomorrow, it's becoming too stressful. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 21:41, July 24, 2013 (UTC) :I'm okay with re-evaluating conversations we had 7 years ago. I don't see Talk:Falco as having been delivered from Mount Sinai. —Scott (message me) 21:59, July 24, 2013 (UTC) ::It's too hot for me and nothing I've typed seems to have made a difference. Do what you want, I wish I hadn't brought it up, but I will stick to my guns on categorizing Elfman as a Celebrity and putting him in connections lists, and I still think it's setting a bad precedent. (We never did give Piero Umiliani a page, in part because again it all could be said on Mahna Mahna, and that's also in the guidelines; sorry to be cranky, I'm just really not feeling well and feeling pressured as the only one to try to find this stuff, which is another reason that when we get a chance we really need to re-organize the guidelines pages and expand and such, for easier access: Notability, or rather giving more info per click, and we do include images as info in that sense, so that helps. In this case, once one's trimmed the stuff that doesn't count at all, it's one song sampled and Wikipedia-type stuff). But this has worn me out so I wave the white flag. We'll just have to explain to people that we only apply this to Danny Elfman or whatever is decided because they're famous enough. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 22:25, July 24, 2013 (UTC) :::Are you upset? I get the feeling you're upset. We can come back to this another time, it's not important. —Scott (message me) 22:37, July 24, 2013 (UTC) ::::Yeah, I'll respond tomorrow or whenever I feel better (as I kept trying to say as well, there's a lot of stuff going on right now for me; I already cried and I still kind of want to scream). But I just feel like I'm beating my head against a figurative wall, that the burden is on me to find all the past discussions and to keep repeating points (three basic guidelines which Elfman fails to date), and so on, and I admit I just don't fathom why Elfman should be an exception. Anyway, it's not fun right now so I'll try to deal with it later when I feel like it. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 22:44, July 24, 2013 (UTC)